Police yesterday said it was investigating circumstances under which city businessman Karim Hirji acquired a piece of government land in Entebbe to construct a shopping mall and hotel suites.

The land on plot 7 Lugard Avenue in Entebbe Town, had been housing government buildings that were recently vandalised by thugs.“We were waiting for the boundary opening report that we acquired recently and we are now seeking a second opinion from the Director of Public Prosecutions to move on with the case,” Ms Beata Chelimo, the Commandant Special Investigations Unit told the Daily Monitor yesterday.

The police remarks follow a directive from the permanent secretary ministry of Lands, Mr Gabindade Musoke, instructing police to investigate the status of the government- owned land that is suspected to have been grabbed. Mr Hirji, who was reportedly out of the country, told this newspaper that he had never grabbed any government land.

“That [land] is in my neighbourhood but I have no interest in it. A survey conducted recently found that I had not encroached on any land,” he said on phone. According to the report, Mr Hirji who occupies plot 5 encroached on government land, which is plot 7, measuring 25.70 square meters or 0.003 hectares. The numbered concrete mark

the reportAccording to Mr Sam Okirya, the government surveyor who authored the report, concrete mark stones 1, 9 and 10 were found missing, which shows that they were replaced.